So when is LimeWire 5.0 coming and what changes are to be added, like new GUI and what else?

i don't know, i just hope it has a new look.

What kind of new looks would you like to see?

Something really good, i dunno really, just because the same simular GUI has been used in LimeWire for a very long time, just thought it would be time for a change?

Why change what works? We get lots of praise for having a simplistic and easy to use interface. If you have ideas on what we can improve, add, remove, change, etc... let us know. Otherwise, we're pretty happy with how it's working.

I have been thinking about uncluttering the interface, especially for smaller screen estate as found on non-developers machines.

The main gripe I have with the current interface is how cramped the initial screen is with search input, search results and current downloads. It has gotten fairly compressed if you think about how the screen switches from search input to current query filtering. At least a non-technical friend of mine was fairly surprised about the sudden screen change.

My idea would be to reorganize the tabs slightly to ease up the pressure on the initial screen. The initial tab search should be confined to entering new searches and should not display any results nor current downloads. It should be renamed "New Search" to more prominently describe it's function. A second tab should be named "Search Results" and should hold the table currently on the top right of the current search tab exclusively, with the filter panel on the left permanently and contextually dependend on which of the sub-tab for the current search result is selected. The monitor tab should hold both the current up and downloads, I consider the incoming search display obsolete by now and if it is to be kept at all it should be on a tab by itself that is hidden by default.

Am I off track with that idea or does it sound reasonable?

Moving downloads away from search results is a long-standing issue of contention in the interface. I'm pretty certain LimeWire is the only P2P program that has the two in the same tab. My personal thoughts on the design waver back and forth every few months. However, with the introduction of the 'downloading', 'save', and 'incomplete' icon on search results, it might be okay to move them to a separate tab.

Keep in mind that absolutely anything that changes this drastically would need to have a way to keep it the same. For instance, we could introduce a 'Wizard' mode and a 'Classic' mode -- much like WinZip has. Or, in 'Classic' mode we could have a preference that moves downloads into the monitor and moves incoming searches into the Connections tab (or some other unknown place).

As far as having a separate tab for New Searches & Search results... I'm not sure how I feel about that. It'd be very strange to auto-switch tabs after enterring a search, and even stranger to not show the results after searching. If downloads are gone from the search results, though, the filters can be above the results (like they are on iTunes).

I was not entirely sure about the this seperation myself as it is a quite radical interface change. But on the plus side it allows the ever growing special metadata search area to grow without any messy scrolling. It would also be possible to add shortcut buttons like clearing the autocomplete cache at a prominent space and would allow to make the cache permanent. And not seperating new search and search results does not really ease up the compressed first screen at all as it does not resolve the conflict of the filter area with the search input form.

Is this going to connect to some other network like g2 or neo network?

limewire should be multi-network